U.S. Pat. No. 4,957,829, issued Sep. 18, 1990, in the name of Joel T. Holl for "Modular Battery Plant System Assembly Comprising Multiple Unit Cell Modules," and assigned to the assignee hereof, discloses assemblages of electric batteries in which terminals of the batteries project above the plastic housings thereof, the batteries are joined in rows (FIG. 2) so that the positive and negative terminals of the batteries in each row are aligned in two straight lines of terminals of which one and the other consist solely of positive terminals and solely of negative terminals, respectively, and in which two busbars 205,206 respectively overlie and contact these two lines of terminals to each electrically couple together the battery terminals in the respectively corresponding one of such lines to an output terminal at the end of that busbar.
Because those busbars occupy space above the tops of the batteries in each row, it is necessary that the vertical space required to store the assemblage of a row of such batteries be large enough to accommodate those busbars.
Moreover, while a plurality of rows of such batteries can be assembled into a two-dimensional array or tier of rows and columns of such batteries (FIG. 3), because of the busbars which must go with each row, it is not possible to superpose the batteries one on top of each other so that any battery in underlying relation to one or more other batteries has directly transmitted thereto the weight of such one or more other batteries. Instead, it is necessary that each tier of batteries be placed on a corresponding separate one of a plurality of support trays stacked above each other in a vertical frame to be individually secured to and mounted by that frame.